Price of a Kiss (Forbidden Men #1)(60)

I grinned and winked. “Cross my heart and hope to die.”

He snorted at my joke, but the tension in his shoulders settled. For a microsecond, anyway. Then he winced. “That’s not all. Mom went and invited our landlady to the party. And she said yes.”

“Oh, that’s nice,” I started, scooping up the first sliced piece to wiggle it onto a plate. Then it struck me. I glanced at him. “Wait. Is this the same landlady who was your first—”

I broke off as he seared me with a threatening glare.

“Right,” I finished slowly. “Well…this should be fun.”

I couldn’t wait to meet his cherry-popping, cougar pimp landlady again. Said no one ever.

Mason spun away to pace the kitchen, much the same way he’d paced my living room the night before. He even ran his hands through his hair, making it all sexy and tousled, which wouldn’t do. I so did not want the cougar to see him looking sexy and tousled.

“I hate it when she comes over,” he ranted quietly. “She always manages to find a way to corner me somewhere and talk. It makes my skin crawl.”

Grabbing his arm when he passed, I paused in my slicing duties to pat his hair back into place. He was still too sexy for my comfort, but his locks no longer held that just-rolled-out-of-bed look. Standing passively before me, he let me groom him as his eyes ran over my face.

“Do you want me to protect you from the mean old cougar?” I asked sympathetically.

He dropped his head and leaned in toward me as if he wanted to rest his face on my shoulder. “Yes.”

“Done.” I grinned and licked frosting off the butter knife.

He glanced up and his lips quirked with amusement. “You got a little something.” Stepping closer, he reached out and gently rubbed his thumb slowly—oh, my God, so agonizingly, deliciously slowly—over the corner of my lip. When he withdrew his hand, there was a dab of pink frosting on his finger.

Feeling a little breathless and dazed, I flicked out my tongue to the spot where I could still feel an echo of his touch. I was tempted to dip up a finger full of more frosting straight off the top of the cake and intentionally smear it all over my mouth just so he’d touch me like that again. But I was a good girl. Drawing in a shuddered breath, I watched him stick his thumb into his mouth and suck the icing away.

Dear God.

My bra suddenly felt itchy around my way-too-sensitive girly parts, and my panties were no longer all that comfortable either. I’d never grown so turned on, like full-out aroused, by simply looking at a guy before, as in, one more lick of frosting would have me screaming out a healthy release.

But Mason Lowe let off some powerful pheromones. My body soaked them in and begged for more.

As if he knew he was causing all my hormones to whimper and squirm, his eyes heated and he swayed toward me. A foot of space between us became six inches. Then three.

Danger. Danger, Will Robinson, my heart screamed, thudding against my ribcage as if it were pounding on the door to my head to get my attention and pull me back to reason.

Holding my breath, I turned away and snagged up the can of mixed nuts to open the lid. “You know, I might’ve been saving that frosting for later.”

His chuckle was strained. “But you know me. If you have food on you, I’m bound to steal it.”

“True.” I ripped off the freshness seal to the nuts before offering him some.

“See, you do know me.” With a sensual grin, he took out a handful.

His fingers lingered in the jar, so I frowned. “Don’t take them all. The guests might want some.”

His grin fell flat. “Those guests better start treating my sister right, or they can kiss my ass.”

Not fair. If anyone was getting the honor of touching his perfect, tight tush, it really should be me, not a bunch of snobby little teens who were upsetting his sister. Really.

“Don’t worry,” I told him with a wink. “I have a plan for the little children. They’ll be eating out of Sarah’s hand before the end of the day.”

Mason shook his head. “You’re smiling a bit too evilly right now. I don’t know whether to be awed or scared.”

“Awed,” I answered as I fluttered my fingers over the rough stubble on his cheek with flair. “Always be awed of me.”

He smiled and swayed close, looking drugged by my touch. “I usually am.”

His reaction did naughty things to me. Things I loved but couldn’t think about right now. What was important was that I had successfully calmed all his frazzled nerves. Damn, was I good or what?

But with Mason pacified, it was time to save my little buddy.





CHAPTER NINETEEN




“We’ve got food,” I cheered as I entered the living room in front of Mason with my arms loaded with plates full of cake and ice cream and mixed nuts. Serving Sarah first, I set her treat on the TV tray beside her chair and manually placed the plastic fork in her hand. “Here you go, my lovely. I made sure you got the most frosting on your—” I gasped. “Oh, my God, we didn’t sing happy birthday and let you blow out the candles.”

“Sarah has too much trouble with candles,” Mason answered as he gave his mother a plate of food and then handed another to Leann. “We usually skip that part.”